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Wednesday, August 01, 2012

I might never have to go to the grocery store again! Yay teenagers legally driving!

Haha, that makes it sound like illegally driving was ever an option. What? No! Not even in the Shoppers Drug Mart parking lot!

So it's been a couple weeks since Annyong won her driving test. It's been extremely advantageous for me because now I can say things like "hey sweetie I'm going out to the barn, can you take a five out of the grocery jar and go into town to get a bag of milk?" or "will you drive your brother to bow club while I'm working" or "gas tank's empty. Go fill it."

We can all three go out on some errand-running mission, but I can send them off to do a thing while I'm doing a thing and then they can come pick me up.

They could even go pick up a friend - without me! I know I could trust them too because one day they had a friend over and the three of them put gas in the truck and only stopped off at mcYuk's as opposed to going to mcYuk's before gathering up three more teenagers for a grease fueled joyride. Aw, my kids are so goooood!

On top if this, the kids and I have (drumroll please) inherited the Jetta tadaaaaaa! Yep we're a 3 vehicle family now. We are in that strange position where we need another set of wheels so the kids can go get jobs, which they can't walk or bike to because we live in the country, but then they NEED jobs so they can pay for insurance and fuel for a third vehicle, and of course then we're back into a car payment for the new one and suddenly I don't like where this is going, but anyways.

The Honey Badger is guarding the barn until we need it for actual truck stuff and the Jetta takes us everywhere else. I'm not going through $60 a week in has anymore. One of these days I'll fill the VW tank and see how long it takes to get through a tank of diesel.

Haha, I never realized how weird milks bags are until I met an American girl living in Canada who can NOT deal with it - suddenly I realized it is kinda unnerving having a bag in a pitcher with the corner cut off but heck that's just the beginning. We Canadians have got many different kinds of weird! And it's all different from American weirdness!!!!

Girl, I would teach you how to parallel park that car. I would bestow you with pickup truck level parking badassery. It is in you! If short legged me with poor depth perception can do it, and teach my kid after she learned in the driving instructor's little car, then it's possible for anybody to park a truck!!!!

Who used up all the gas? You said you only wanted to drive to the corner store!

My needs trumps yours...

You drive the car, you don't live in it. Clean it up once in a while.

You have to be home when you said you would be ... that's a sacred covenant... else you forfeit all your rights. Mix in: driving my car is a privilege not a right.

Would it hurt you to ----- ? (fill in blank, as needed). Just once, it would be nice if you ---- (be creative for extra points).

Then arm yourself with a pocketful of if's... If you get a ticket... for speeding or parking or running a red light... If you touch alcohol... If I smell smoke in the car... if...if...if...

One added advantage is that you now have a ready made culprit for all that happens. You now have an owner for that ding on the fender or scratch on the paintwork. Also an explanation for any expense. My personal favorite is "you brake too hard, too often" to align cause and effect for a stiff repair bill.

But there are many positives as well. You learn to trust your offspring's skill and judgment; share the work load in all transportation; as well as a new negotiation leverage, "if you want the car..."

About Me

I ride, I read, I write. I share my life with a husband, two teenagers, a Pug, a scary house cat, and three horses. Pink is my favourite colour. I used to hate it but then my brain got rearranged and now I like it so much I sometimes dye my hair pink. I'm slightly crazy and I believe we should all stop saying crazy like it's a bad thing. I write novels - like as in, I start them and actually finish them - and I fully intend to be a published author. I teach people how to ride horses for a living, and I love my job! All I ever wanted to do was ride my ponies and write my stories. Hey, that's what I do! Lucky, lucky me. Join me for horses, trucks, Johnny Depp, antidepressants, beer, trashy pop culture, interior desecrating, Jesus, John Deere, and rock stars. Yeeaahhh! We'll laugh and cry, it'll be fun, c'mon.